Dust storms and related weather events occur regularly in certain environments, such as arid regions. Dust storms and windblown dust impair optical visibility due to the airborne dust particles (and other airborne particles) generated by the storm or wind. In addition to localized sudden storms, there exist the other known global storms, which occur yearly. Cyclogenic, Frontal and Haboob storm types significantly reduce visibility. Examples are the African Haboob, American Haboob, and Khamsin in the Middle East and Asia. Impairment of optical visibility in close proximity to the ground surface is problematic for individuals and operators of vehicles and other ground-based systems as well as aircraft traffic on airport control operators. In particular, optical visibility in a substantially horizontal direction is important to many individuals due to the “line of sight” requirements for many activities and businesses.
Certain existing systems for determining optical visibility in an environment focus on vertical measurements of the location of the dust storm, such as those performed by satellite. Although these existing systems may provide useful visibility information, they do not provide optical visibility information in a substantially horizontal direction in close proximity to the ground surface. Other existing systems focus on determining optical visibility due to precipitation in wet regions using extinction or scattering coefficients of small volumes of rain or fog rather than determining optical visibility due to suspended dust particles in close proximity to the ground surface. Although these existing systems may provide useful visibility information, they do not provide optical visibility information in a substantially horizontal direction, within airborne dust particle clouds in close proximity to the ground surface.